Good day for Indians

UBEDA, (SPAIN), JAN. 23. It was another good day for the Indians in the second round of the `Ciudad-de-Ubeda' international Open chess tournament here at Ubeda, teenaged international master Sandipan Chanda scored an upset victory over Cuban grandmaster Dominguez and multiple IM norm holders Sriram Jha and Dinesh Kumar Sharma held grandmasters Zilbreman of Israel and Yendemirov of Russia respectively.

Sandipan's startling victory came in 39 moves from his current favourite Taimanov variation of Sicilian defence. Both players followed contemporary theory till the 18th move when the GM diverged with a new move. Taking almost half an hour for his reply, Sandipan came up with a good gameplan and steered right into complications.

Coming under time pressure, the Grandmaster faltered in losing material first in the form of a pawn and later a piece. Realising the futility in continuing with the game any further, he tendered his resignation to a smiling Sandipan.

Jha continued with his fine form to hold Zilbreman to a fighting draw in the white side of Alekhine defence. The game followed the D.K. Sharma versus Zilbreman encounter from the Linares tournament until the GM surprised white by choosing a different plan and took the upper hand. An undaunted Jha fought back to equalise the game in a rook and minor piece ending to achieve a draw in 30 moves.

Another fine draw came from triple IM norm holder Sharma who held Yendemirov from the white side of the `siesta variation' of Stenitz defence in the Ruy Lopez opening. The GM equalised the game when Sharma deviated from the normal theory. After the speedy exchange of the major pieces, the game pettered into a draw in 22 moves.

IM R. B. Ramesh lost in a miniature of 21 moves against third seed GM Boris Avrukh of Israel. Playing the semislav defence with black pieces, Ramesh fell into a tricky opening trap set by the GM through transposition of moves. He was forced to accept the Greek sacrifice of white's bishop on `H7' that resulted in his king being dragged out into the open. Faced with the choices of the loss of a piece or inevitable mate, black resigned the game.

In an interesting battle, IWM Aarthie Ramaswamy secured a draw against IM J. Ivanov of Bulgaria in 50 moves. Facing the `centre counter' defence, Aarthie got the better of the opening stage. She continued her aggression with an exchange sacrifice to obtain a winning position. However, she fell into time pressure and allowed her higher rated opponent to steer the game into a drawish `queen and rook' versus `queen and bishop' endgame with pawns only on one side of the board.

IM-elect Rahul Shetty and K. Visweswaran came up with smooth victories over their unrated opponents Jimenez Lindez and N. Sanz (both from Spain), respectively.

Important results: L. Dominguez (0.5) lost to Sandipan Chanda (1.5); Sriram Jha (1.5) drew with Zilbreman (1.5) ; Avrukh (2) bt R.B. Ramesh (1); Rahul Shetty (1) bt R. Jimenez Lindez (0) ; D. K. Sharma (1) drew with V. Yendemirov (1) ; Aarthie Ramaswamy (0.5) drew with J. Ivanov (0.5) ; K. Visweswaran (1) bt N. Sanz (0); Motylev (1.5) bt C.S. Gokhale (0.5)

-UNI.

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